


Dipping My Toe

by DementedPixie



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Caring Dean Winchester, Caring Sam Winchester, Dean makes Cass soup, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Castiel, Hurt/Comfort, Sick Castiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-06 22:44:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6773311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DementedPixie/pseuds/DementedPixie





	Dipping My Toe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [drwhogirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/drwhogirl/gifts).



Dedicated to Ellie & Meg & Asylum 16

 

At the risk of sounding wholly un-original, I made him soup. It seemed the best thing to do. As I stirred the mix of somewhat hurriedly chopped vegetables I leaned back on my heels slightly so that I could see into the other room. Through the gap in the door, past the bulging coat-rack that now had the addition of a dripping wet trench coat, I could just see him. A silent, huddled, bedraggled figure sat on the edge of the sofa. I couldn’t see his face which, considering the state he was in when we found him, was probably a good thing, but at least I knew he was safe now. Protected. Cared for. 

As I watched, Sam appeared from the bedroom and draped a blanket around the defeated angel’s shoulders before taking a seat close beside him on the sofa.

An urgent bubbling brought my attention back to the stove and, after turning off the heat, I poured some of the soup into a bowl before carefully carrying it through to the other room. 

I sat on the coffee table in front of Cas and looked him over. In all of the time I have known him, I have never seen him look so bad. Yes, there were physical injuries, a sign of what he had been through since he lost his Grace, but it was more than that. His eyes looked... empty, soul-less, like they had seen too many bad things to ever recover.

I held out the bowl but got no response at all, so I balanced it on my knee and picked up the spoon myself. I’d gone to the trouble of making the damn soup, the least he could do was eat it. Filling the spoon with a little of the fragrant, hot broth, I blew on it to cool it a little then held it up to him. Blue eyes widened in surprise as he instinctively parted his lips. Nobody made jokes about feeding babies. I just carried on, spoonful after spoonful, until after he had managed about half a dozen he shook his head at me and slumped back in his seat. 

Sam, presumably sharing the part of Mother with me this night, pulled the blanket further around Cas and then put his own arm around the still shaking shoulders. Sam looked almost as devastated as Cas, on the verge of tears himself. 

I knew how he felt. This wasn’t our Castiel. The powerful angel of the Lord who had rescued me from hell. This broken man needed to be put back together again. 

I put the bowl on the table and moved to sit next to him, so that he had each of us supporting him from both sides. This wasn’t about crowding him out, or invading his personal space. This was about showing him we were there for him. And always would be. 

“I have been here for a very long time...” whispered Cas, his voice as shaky as his hands. “And I remember many things...”

It was the first time he had spoken since we found him, unconscious, broken, half drowned, lying in the silt on the bank of the river. 

I put my hand on his knee, trying to impart my own warmth into his chilled bones. 

“I know,” I said. “Sleep now. Me and Sam, we got your back.”

And the angel slept.


End file.
